Take Back the Night pictures

Courtesy of one of my guy friends who was at the event with the camera, but couldn't march (women-only, trans-inclusive). They're awesome. The pictures are in order from the bottom up. Thanks a bunch to you.

No pictures with me visible (I prefer to remain at least partially anonymous), but I am behind the group of standing girls in the top. I think you might be able to see some of my leg, but not much more. Tata for now.

Take Back the Night

As promised, here is a lovely post about my school's Take Back the Night program. You're lucky all I have to do here is type, because I have little to no voice.

At 7:30 was a rally to get everybody pumped up for the night ahead. First on the program was a vocal artist/poet/singer Crista Bell. She was very woman-oriented and had a fire within her that spread, eventually to the crowd of mostly women, with a few men intermixed. She was vagina-friendly. Then came a group of students each saying why they fought against sexual violence. After that a trio performed a poem-thingy called "My short skirt" about the fact that wearing a short skirt is not an invitation to rape. A female musician, Misty Flowers was next, and she sung (and played the guitar to) a version of the song/poem "I rise" (Still I rise?) originally written by Maya Angelou but sung by Ben Harper. Last, but not least, were the Radical Cheerleaders, women with lots of enthusiasm for the rights of women to feel safe everywhere.

After we went outside it took a couple minutes for everyone to get out, some people lit up (gross!) and I got to meet someone new who I pretty much stuck around for most of the march. We marched all around the campus, getting a few new women along the way, escorted by the city police (Whoot! We had a police escort! Whoot!). Then we went to the downtown, yelling inspiration slogans along the way. There were many people just standing or sitting outside their homes watching and listening to us. Then we went back up a whole bunch of hills to the place outside our performing arts center where we started. Misty Flowers sang again, first Stand by Me, which the crowd joined in to, appropriately, then four more songs about getting out of her abusive relationship, which were so wonderful. There is almost nothing so beautiful as a lone voice accompanied by an acoustic guitar, it is just so, how can I say it, awe-inspiring and classically beautiful, primal and essential.

After that there was tea and cookies for everyone, including the men, who held a candlelight vigil while we women were out marching. At this point I realized that I had lost my voice, despite my extensive use of my diaphragm (I knew learning how to sound off in NJROTC would help me sometime) and not as much of my vocal cords to power my chants. I got to see some people I've only heard about, but somehow just recognized from an oft-heard description. Weird how that works sometimes. The mint tea I had allowed me a little of my voice back for half a minute or so between sips (gulps really), which was nice, and I'm hoping sleep will help with it too. I think I may have to have another day of silence, or almost silence, tomorrow.

I guess I should turn in. Tata for now.

National Day of Silence

Just for anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about:

"The Day of Silence is an annual event held to bring attention to anti-LGBT bullying, harassment and discrimination in schools. Students and teachers nationwide will observe the day in silence to echo the silence that LGBT and ally students face everyday."

(According to http://www.dayofsilence.org)

In practicality it is simply observed. Anyone who is LGBT or an ally is silent for the length of the school day to draw attention to the LGBT people who, for many reasons, including "bullying, harassment, and discrimination", remain silent. My university observed it yesterday, but I figured I'd observe it on the official day, heck the more attention brought to the issue the better.

My school day has ended, so now I may speak. I officially said that it ended at 4:00 this afternoon, ten minutes after the ending of my last class. It is weird that the first words to come out of my mouth today were to my roommate, telling her the door was unlocked.

Being silent for a day has taught me a lot. Normally I am a very talkative person around the people I know well, including talking to myself. Today I had to remember to keep my mouth shut.

Let me start with the most practical of things:

I don't think we quite realize how much we depend on verbal communication to get by in our world, especially in school. I hear the people talking all around me and all I can do is think to myself. Some simple communications could be answered with a yes or no, a nod or head-shaking. Others, such as group assignments were a little bit more difficult. In Biology today we had to do an extra-credit thing in groups and the girl who was in the group with me asked "Did you take a vow of silence?" and because, effectively, I had, I nodded. Anything I had to say during that time was either typed out on my calculator (thanks to the power of my TI-83 Plus graphing calculator) or on my laptop if it was longer than was practical to use the calculator for. She would read it off my computer screen to the guy in our group who was writing the extra credit out. It was actually awesome and quite inspiring.

What really amazed me is when I was eating lunch it felt like every time I bit or chewed that I was talking in a way, moving my jaw in the same way as one does when talking. I know that sounds odd, but it did.

I don't know if my actions/lack of words today has affected anyone in any other than a basic way, but if it has affected one person I know that my school day without verbal communication was
worth every second.

Take Back the Night is tomorrow, so you can expect to hear from me about that soon after, as I promised.

Tata for now.

Does nobody realize it's Tuesday, April 10th?

The only people who actually seem to realize what day it is are those who charged me money.

The stupid job that I want to apply for is missing the job application online that was supposed to be up yesterday April 9th, it says so itself on the website. One of the blogs I like to read that updates on Tuesdays and Thursdays has not updated today already, but he has, in the past, updated later in the day or the next day if he hasn't by this time in the morning.

I just wish that they would get their act together.

I guess I must say tata for now.

Sunny day...

You don't get weather much better than this in early April. Almost seventy degrees out with barely a cloud in the sky. There was no way that I was going to eat lunch outside this afternoon, so I got some small snack-like things from a cafe and sat outside on the grass in front of the building in which I have class now. One of my friends joined me just after I finished and we just laid in the sun until I figured I should probably leave to get a decent seat in this huge class.

According to the newspaper we could reach record highs, possibly about eighty degrees outside today and seventy tomorrow. The average temperature for this time of the year is fifty-six degrees, which is what I believe it will be next week. Man I wish I was smart enough this morning to wear capris and a tank top, but there's no way I could have known it would get this warm until I got out of class.

Class now, so tata for now.

A deal...

Okay everybody whose blog I read regularly please update more frequently. Even if it is just to tell your audience that you are alive. Anything for me to read please. In exchange I will blog more frequently and try to write more blogs with actual substance to them, something people will actually care about. Please just do this for me.

In other news:

1. I have had at least one of each of my classes for Spring Quarter. Whoot.
2. I have exhausted my blog supply for the day. I keep checking each of my favorite blogs to see if they'll update, but no, they don't that often.
3. I will do a blog about my school's Take Back the Night event either that night or sometime the Friday and weekend after. I promise. Even if it is just a few sentences describing it, I will write.
4. My sinuses hated me yesterday. Stupid tree pollen. Yes, flowers are pretty, but my mild case of allergies is not. Such a conflict.
5. It was such a beautiful day yesterday. What went wrong?

I can't think of anything more that has any substance, so tata for now.

The first day of class

Ah, the first day of class spring quarter. Nothing like it. I get to start off pretty slow, but tomorrow I have all my classes, but I planned it well enough so that I have plenty of time between classes, unlike last quarter.

I got to meet some new people today. Two of them were one of my friend's friends from high school and they were just as cool as she had described them to be. I can see why she likes them. The other two were sisters touring the campus from California, one who's looking into the Honors program here. I showed them around my room and the rest of the dorm (which is technically the Honors dorm), gave them some random facts, and they went on their way.

Not a bad day, really.

Tata for now.